OGDEN, Utah — The Wildlife Rehabilitation Center of Northern Utah is on the move, and they are trying to get their temporary facility up and running before their old building is demolished next month.
With paint brushes, rollers, ladders and hammers, volunteers are working tirelessly to fix an old building in Ogden to turn it into a sanctuary for animals in need.
"We've had paint peeling off the walls, wallpaper that wasn’t holding paint, so we've had to scrape walls, re-sheetrock, plumbing — just a whole variety of things we didn’t expect,” said DaLyn Marthaler, the executive director of the Wildlife Rehabilitation Center of Northern Utah.
In 2023, Ogden City decided not to renew the center's lease after 12 years of being in that property to make room for the Ogden Dinosaur Park next door. Since May, the center has not been able to accept any new mammals or birds to treat and care for. They have been looking for a new home.
"Right now, because of this notification, and being forced to move, we have had to halt all intakes of animals," Marthaler said. "We typically take in 4,000 animals a year. That has left 4,000 animals with nowhere to go."
The demolition day set for the building is March 7, but Marthaler said they did not even know until a couple of weeks ago that the building would be torn down so quickly.
"I was kind of taken aback by that. I did not expect that,” she said. “That had never been communicated to us. We had a forbearance agreement that said we could have time after that with a lease agreement, so hearing it was going to be demoed was pretty shocking."
So now, they are rushing with less than a month to go to get the new facility functional and safe for animals.
"This is a whole community coming together,” explained Marthaler, "And giving whatever they can bring to the table and offering it up, and making it happen. People have come out of the woodwork to help us out and we love that so much"
The center purchased their new building, which is a combination of the Osmonds' grandparents' home and an old vacuum repair store. But it’s still a temporary home while they look for land to construct a new facility.
"In this facility, we cannot do anything aquatic. So no pelicans, no beavers, no otters, and we're the only ones in the state of Utah that can do those animals right now," Marthaler said. "They will not have a resource until we're able to build."
They hope the community continues to support them.
"We need those donations, we need hands, we still need help anywhere we can get it," Marthaler said.
If you would like to help the Wildlife Rehabilitation Center, you can email them at outreach@wrcnu.org.
